


Alternate Medicine

by BlueNeutrino



Series: Heart of a Witcher [2]
Category: Wiedźmin | The Witcher (Video Game), Wiedźmin | The Witcher - All Media Types, Wiedźmin | The Witcher Series - Andrzej Sapkowski
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Heartbeats, Missing Scene
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-03-25
Updated: 2018-03-25
Packaged: 2019-04-07 23:49:24
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,119
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14092419
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BlueNeutrino/pseuds/BlueNeutrino
Summary: Short missing scene from “Blood of Elves”. Shani’s lying with a sleeping witcher in an Oxenfurt dorm room content to curl up and fall asleep on his warm chest. Until she realises something very important appears to be missing.





	Alternate Medicine

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ValmureEld](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ValmureEld/gifts).



> For ValmureEld, who’s been wanting me to write this scene for a while but I never got round to finishing it.

The body at Shani’s side is solid and warm. A sheen of sweat still clings to her skin, dampening the sheets, and the smell of sex hangs in the air. She grins, the buzz of ecstasy still not having quite abated as she contemplates that the past hour had actually _happened_.

There’s an actual witcher in her bed. A witcher here in Oxenfurt on important business that he needs help with, and she, one young, pretty medical student out of many, had turned his head.

Their mutual acquaintance with Dandelion had probably helped, though she’s not about to give the troubadour too much credit.

Shani snuggles closer and rests her head on the witcher’s chest. Geralt is already asleep. Much to her surprise, he’d passed out almost immediately after, though she supposes perhaps it’s a learned skill to fall asleep at will. There are definite benefits she can see to that, when he’s living life on the road and frequently exhausting himself doing battle with monsters, needing to catch sleep in whatever moments he can.

Or maybe he’s just tired. Either way, she’s glad to have him here. Glad for his tenderness, which she hadn’t expected. Glad for his stamina, which she had. Glad for his warmth and his attention and all the ways he knew to how to please, and oh, she’s glad for the way his heart had pounded as their hands roamed and bodies rocked.

Yes. It had been good.

The smile on Shani’s lips turns soft and affectionate as she rests a hand on his chest beside her head and begins to lazily trace the scars. _So many of them_ , she thinks, and the medic in her is wondering at the story behind each one and how best they should have been treated.

She’s been lying like that for a minute or so when she starts to realise something’s wrong. She can’t hear his heartbeat.

Frowning, Shani lifts her head and studies the witcher’s face, moving her hand to assess whether she can detect his breathing. She can’t.

“Shit. Geralt?”

For a moment, she freezes. She remembers how quickly he’d fallen asleep and suddenly panic grips her. What if that had been him fainting? What if he has allergies? She’s spent half the day elbow deep in embalming fluid and many of the herbs and medicines she works with are far from harmless to someone with the wrong biological makeup. They can make a man’s throat close up or stop his heart if his body’s inclined to react the wrong way. There’s no telling what a witcher’s body might do.

Shani fights back the panic as she presses her fingers to Geralt’s throat, locating the notch between trachea and tendons where she expects to find the carotid pulse. The seconds pass, maybe ten of them, and when Shani still hasn’t felt anything her stomach flips over. Now what?

At the very least, he’s still warm, so it can’t have been long. Even when she’s not thinking straight there’s still some muscle memory she’s retained from her training. She leans in, tilts back his head, pinches his nose, and blows into his mouth. She does that twice before moving onto his chest, lacing her fingers over his sternum and preparing to lean in with brutal force, when she realises Geralt has already reacted.

He groans, hands reaching up to bat away the weight pressing on his breastbone and rubbing at his mouth. His eyes are open, confused pupils visibly narrowing as they focus on her. “Shani, what...?”

Shani gasps. She falls back, resting on her knees, and just stares. “I thought you were dead,” she says lamely. The panicked tension gripping her muscles at once melts away, and now all she feels is embarrassed.

Geralt’s eyes dart around the room as if expecting to find something different, some detail to explain that, but everything is the same as earlier. He looks at her, bewildered. “Did I miss something?”

Now that the initial shock has passed, Shani finds she’s trembling and is fighting a strange urge to cry. “I couldn’t hear your heartbeat. I had my head on your chest and there was...nothing.”

“Oh.” Now he’s the one who looks embarrassed. “I’m sorry,” he says, voice gruff and awkward. “That’s normal for me. Never thought it might alarm a medic. Here.” He takes hold of the hand he’s just pushed from his chest and settles it back into place over his heart, more gently this time, but firm enough that she’ll feel it. “It’s not gone. Just slow.”

Shani is patient, certain not to overreact again, and then after a few seconds she feels a strong, powerful nudge against her palm. She lets out a breath. “Geralt…”

His heart beats rhythmically and reliably beneath her hand, still disconcertingly slow, yet she’d never mistake it for absent. The rhythm of it is soothing, and she feels her trembling still as her own pulse gradually returns to normal. He looks up at her patiently, concerned, and she’s grateful he doesn’t appear to be judging her for her foolishness.

“It was slower than this before,” she remarks after a while. “There must have been beats I missed. Geralt, I swear I felt for a pulse far longer than I should have, and there was still nothing there.”

“It’s slower when I sleep,” he explains, and she thinks he seems self-conscious. “Couldn’t tell you how slow. I mean, I’m not awake to count it.”

“Maybe I’ll have to find out now I know not to panic.” She files that information away for if she ever has to treat a witcher. Or for next time she might find herself resting contentedly on Geralt’s chest, if she hasn’t scared him away.

Geralt frowns and gives her a quizzical look. “One other thing: when you thought I was dead, what were you planning to do? You were pressing on my chest.”

“Oh.” She blushes again. “It’s how they teach us to revive someone whose heart has stopped. If it won’t beat on its own, we have to pump it.”

“And the other thing with my mouth?” He gestures at his lips.

“Rescue breaths. If you aren’t breathing, then we breathe for you.”

He smiles at her playfully, affectionately, and suddenly she isn’t embarrassed anymore. “You think you could show me that one again?”

Shani leans down over him, smiling as she feels the heat from his body and the reassurance of his heartbeat beneath her, and presses her lips to his. He cradles her face and kisses her tenderly back.

When he pulls away again with a grumble moments later, she feels annoyed.

“Dammit.”

“Geralt, what is it?”

“There’s somebody at the window.”

 


End file.
